A new study, published in Global Change Biology, employs novel methodological advances to examine the movement of carbon dioxide (CO2) in and out of northern terrestrial ecosystems and identify the CO2 uptake and release patterns across different regions. Because northern permafrost regions store around half of global soil organic carbon, which is vulnerable to decomposition and emission to the atmosphere with climate warming, improving understanding of high-latitude region carbon fluctuations is essential to tracking global carbon budgets and mitigating the impacts of climate change.